Comment by happyhardcore

Comment by happyhardcore 16 hours ago

8 replies

I've found [1] to be the best guide for getting started with them; you need to make a copy of the firmware partitions that you re-flash after installing Linux onto it in order to get the 4G modem working. It's honestly absurd how much you're getting for a fiver with it; add a power bank (or make your own from scavenged vape batteries in the spirit of this post) and you have a full Linux machine with WiFi and 4G that can work almost anywhere.

[1] https://wvthoog.nl/openstick/

motorest 16 hours ago

What an interesting gadget! It looks like it has most of the features of an Orange Pi Zero, but at around 1/5th of the price.

  • sitzkrieg 15 hours ago

    it's almost like everything matching the pi footprint is severely overpriced!

    • motorest 13 hours ago

      There's a silver lining in raspberry pi and it's clones being so relatively expensive: they create a market and demand for hackable devices. In an age with so much pressure to plug every single digital hole, these devices bring some much needed market pressure to the opposite direction.

      • TeMPOraL 9 minutes ago

        Or, put another way: to have electronics so cheap today, we're sacrificing empowerment technology could give us. We have dirt cheap supercomputers in our pocket, but what for? They're just overspecced entertainment machines.

    • cultofmetatron 7 hours ago

      what you're generally paying for is support and community. havin people you can ask questions and knowing there's a good chance that soneone out there has both seen your issue and knows a fix is extremely valuable and worth the money if you're just trying to put together a small one off project.

    • DrewADesign 8 hours ago

      I like the picos. I think there’s a lot of bang for your buck in there for making little devices and prototyping.

    • tkfoss 8 hours ago

      Isn't Orange Pi Zero already sold at cost of material & labor?